Mysteries of the Faith – Part II: Our Triune God

Speaking of God always brings us into the realm of mystery. As mentioned in part I, one meaning of mystery (musth, rion), is something that is beyond the comprehension of man. And God is certainly beyond our understanding. He is timeless and eternal. We are so bound up in time, that to even imagine a timeless being stretches our imaginations to the breaking point.

In looking at the other attributes of God, everything we can say about God is so far beyond those same attributes of man. God exists. Man exists. God lives, man lives, God loves, man loves, God is just, man is just. Augustine writes: We ascend from the imperfections of the creature (imperfect being, life, love etc.) to the absolute perfection in God (perfect being, life, love, etc.). And yet, as high as our thoughts might ascend, we cannot understand the perfect. Our understanding can only reach for it, to try to approach it.

Indeed, Gerhard, a 17^th century Lutheran theologian writes: Although with God Himself, the divine attributes are in reality not distinct one from the other, nor from the divine essence, nevertheless the weakness of our mind requires that we deal with them one by one. ‘God descends to us’ says Augustine, ‘that we might mount upward’. This means that in the word, the attributes of God are separated so that we can get a glimmer of the majesty of God, even though in truth, God is one divine essence.

Who can understand it? Certainly, not I.

In my previous article, I also spoke of another meaning of mystery: something which cannot be understood because, according to human reason, it presents a paradox. And here we come to the Trinity: 3 distinct persons, and yet only one divine essence. Each person, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, are one and the same essence, with all the attributes that make up that essence or substance.

So, what does the Church teach about the Trinity? It teaches that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not 3 Gods, but one God. Each person of the divine Trinity is fully God. Indeed, Jesus is fully God and fully man (but more on that in a later installment).

So why does the church teach this since it is so difficult to understand? Because the Bible teaches it. First, it clearly teaches that there is only one God (see Deut. 6:4, 1 Cor. 8:4) and that we are to worship that one God (Ex. 20:3, Mark 12:29-30). But the Bible just as clearly teaches that the one God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matt. 28:19, 2 Cor 13:14, Matt 3:16-17) Even at the very beginning of the Old Testament this truth can be found (The Father speaks the Word (see John 1), the Spirit moves across the face of the deep). Later, in vs. 26, we have these words: Let us make man in Our image, according to our likeness. Notice the plural, ‘us’, and ‘our’.

The fact that the Old Testament teaches the Trinity is settled once and for all since Jesus and the apostles prove the divine personage (being a person) of the Son and of the Holy Spirit from the Old Testament (Matt. 22:41ff quoting Psalm 110:1; Heb. 1 quoting Ps. 2:7, 2 Sam. 7:14, Ps. 97:7, 45:7, 102, 26-28, 110:1, and other places).

So why do not all who call themselves Christian not adhere to this Biblical teaching? In our minds, 3 cannot be one. Every way in which man tries to describe the Triune God falls short. Some would use the idea of a clover, one clover, but three distinct lobes. But one lobe of a clover, cannot be called the clover, but only a part of it. Again, another way people try to describe the Trinity is using the phases of water, ice, liquid water, and water vapor. But again, this too falls short.

There are many, who, in trying to understand or explain the Trinity, ended up denying the truths stated above. If I were to go into all of those who throughout the years, denied this teaching, it would fill the newspaper this is printed in many times over.

Currently there are 3 distinct views of God among those who would call themselves Christian. Unitarians, who fall into two groups, modal (God shows himself at different times in different modes, like ice, water and steam) and dynamic (Jesus, and for that matter all believers, are endowed with the indwelling logos, a power emanating from a unipersonal God). The later is the most common found in Unitarian Churches today.

Another view is subordinationism. This is what Arius, a third century heretic, taught, that the son is not of one substance with the Father, but of a like substance with the Father, though a lesser being than the Father. This is still taught by the Jehovah Witnesses.

Finally, there are churches that deny the Trinity by teaching polytheism. There are many Gods, but only one that we have to serve, and if we live a good enough life, we can ourselves become Gods of our own universe. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints would be an example of this error.

There are many terms the Christian Church uses to describe different relationships with the Godhead, including Trinity, person, essence, Homoousia, Filioque, Perichoresis and others that I will not try to describe in this short paper. However, if you would like to explore any of the truths of scripture or terms the church has used to help describe these truths, I would be happy to talk with you. Please call me, Rev. Randolph Schnack, Platte Valley Lutheran Church, at 307 343-2314.